A Vlasov moment description of cyclotron wave endash particle interactions

A quasifluid formalism designed to capture some effects of cyclotron interactions is presented. Starting from the contractions of exact moments of the Vlasov equation, a closure for cyclotron interactions is achieved by using kinetic information directly. This nonperturbative approach does not require a priori assumptions about zeroth-order particle velocity distributions. The nonlinear coupling between field-aligned particle thermal velocities and transverse cyclotron wave and thermal motions are described by off-diagonal elements of the pressure tensor. These elements are related to the growth and damping of cyclotron wave energy. A functional form for an effective wave endash particle momentum transport coefficient is derived from the requirement of consistency between the energy and momentum moment equations, but its specific magnitude and sign, determined by threshold temperature anisotropy levels, must be input from kinetic theory. This effective transport coefficient has a nondefinite sign, reminiscent of the gyroviscous coefficients of classical transport, and is consistent with the time reversibility of the Vlasov equation. A coupled set of cyclotron equations of state for the evolution of the parallel and perpendicular pressures are derived. This formalism provides a connection between known kinetic solutions of cyclotron interactions and fluid plasma equations. copyright 1996 American Institute of Physics